Sonnet—a complete poem consisting fo fourteen iambic pentametre lines with arigid time-scheme-was firste mployed byt he Italian poets.During the Renaissance PeriodFrancesco Petrarch(1304—1374),an Italian poet,who was crowned poet laureate andenjoyed all the honors that his contemporaries could give him,wrote more than 300 son-nets in admiration of a beautiful girl and applied sonnet form in a more perfect way thanhis predecessors.Therefore the Italian sonnet is also called Petrarchan sonnet.In thesixteenth century sonnet was introduced into England and became once very popular.
在目前国内有关美国文学史专著尚属欠缺的情况下，由南开大学外文系主任常耀信教授编撰、经国家教委高校教材编审组审定、推荐的《美国文学简史》（A Survey of American Literature）的出版（南开大学出版社1990年6月第一版）无疑为我国外国文学教学与研究增添了一部难得的教材和学术专著。以英文撰写的这本《简史》是作者多年讲授的研究美国文学的经验与成果的结晶。
